UP government to launch drive for e-procurement of paddy

Uttar Pradesh government will be launching a special campaign for paddy purchase from farmers through e-procurement system from December 2.(HT File Photo)

Uttar Pradesh government will be launching a special campaign for paddy purchase from farmers through e-procurement system from December 2. Chief secretary Rajive Kumar, who took stock of the government’s preparedness for the drive, has directed administration officials to deploy ‘lekhpals’ and staff of the revenue department to guide and assist farmers.

“To create awareness, necessary information regarding the paddy purchase has been given to more than 55 lakhs farmers through SMS and to 5 lakh farmers through mega call centers in the state,” Kumar said. The details of purchase would be uploaded daily on the government portal set up for the purpose.

Principal secretary, food and civil supplies, Nivedita Shukla Verma, who was also present at the meeting, said farmers have been told not to sell their paddy below the fixed price. She said that Rs 15 additional would be paid to farmers for unloading, filtration and cleaning.

Verma said that R 25,000 has been given to 31 districts for publishing the names of the centers and in-charges in the local newspaper to provide information regarding the paddy purchase centers and in-charges to the farmers. “We are closely monitoring the arrangements and laxity would not be tolerated,” she said adding that one marketing superintendent was suspended on charges of irregularities and action against three other officials had been initiated during an inspection by the food commissioner in Hardoi market.

The state government claimed that so far 9.20 lakhs metric tonnes of paddy had been purchased directly from 102,443 out of 2,36,499 registered farmers and Rs 1428.80 crore paid to them. Comparatively only 2.47 lakhs metric tonnes of paddy was purchased from the farmers in the same period last year. The government has set a target of purchasing 50 lakh metric tonnes of paddy this fiscal. While the general variety of paddy would be purchased at the rate of R 1550 per quintal, the advance variety would fetch R 1590 per quintal. Besides R 15 per quintal would be given to farmers as handling charge, which was just R 3 earlier. Paddy purchase centres in western UP would operate till January 31 and till February 28 in Eastern UP.